Whose The Brunette On The Boat In The Lil Dickey Video "Save That Money"?

That's right. This man has disrespected Frozen and the video proof is above. As you know, I have done significant (scholarly?) research on the ins and out of Frozen, aka Training Day meets Snow White. (See in depth analysis here), and its one of the best movies I've seen in the last 3 years. That's why, when I saw this video, I had to dust off my blogging spurs and dig my heels into this here post. So get ready to giddyup dear reader, cause the blog wagon is coming to town!!!

WHO IS JORDAN PETERSON
Now, Jordan Peterson is a famous psychologist who has a ton of youtube videos. My buddy tells me that Jordan Peterson also made his name by refusing to call trans people by their preferred pronouns. I didn't have time to look into that. But now he's stepped right into my wheelhouse, fucking fairy tales, and his bad take on Frozen has gotten my attention.

JORDAN AND FAIRY TALE ANALYSIS
Now, this Jordan guy, he also likes fairy tales. He analyses a few of them on youtube (that is how I stumbled upon his scorching hot take about Frozen). His main thing, and I am generalizing and oversimplifying here, is to use fairy tales and Disney movies to explain a bunch of psychological and sociological points. (He even gets so cocky that he uses them to say that god exists but if Kant can't prove it, neither can he). He discusses fairy tales as journeys were characters learn about themselves and form themselves and grow morally, learn to listen to their conscience, and that truth is important (Pinocchio). He uses them to explain archetypes. The hero who possesses universally admired qualities like vision and power (Mufasa in Lion King when he show Simba the whole kingdom from pride rock). Other themes he touches on are the price of conformity vs. the price of not being part of society, the danger of chaos vs. the danger of an overly tyrannical society and people who do bad anti-social things like Scar in the Lion Kings. He also talks about hierarchies, which again is out of my wheelhouse, but I'm pretty sure he uses them to justify inequality in modern western society. I'm mostly there for the Disney discussions which were pretty interesting. But then, after his take on Frozen, it really makes me question his whole vibe.

Not to brag but I know a bit about fairy tales myself. Fairy tales would be in the title of my whole blog site if I hadn't misspelled it when I first named it. I know and care about all sorts of fairy tales, folk stories, mythologies and whatever else you want to call them. I have a library of leather bond books of classic Japanese, English, Scottish and Jewish mythology. My apartment smells of rich mahogany, and I even took a mythology and folktale class back in Kindergarten. Plus I read the master of modern Fairy Tales himself, Neil Gaiman all the time. So, yeah Fairy Tales are pretty important to me and contrary to Jordan's opinion, Frozen is a Fairly Fucking Good Fairy Tale.

Now, Jordan seems like the type of guy who would be like "I never said that, you're putting words in my mouth" if you refer to anything that he is implying but not actually saying, (which is ironically what I just did) so I am going to use his exact words here. Below is the most important part of his critique of Frozen and if you want more context, or don't believe me cause you can't believe someone could have such a bad opinion about Frozen, watch the video I linked up top.

------WARNING, SPOILER ALERTS BELOW----------------------------------------------------

JORDAN'S QUOTES ON FROZEN

So here are the words of the man himself. Let's see what he has to say.

"...otherwise its one-sided like frozen which was an absolutely dismal and wretched movie"

Ok cut it. cut the tape. First off, Frozen was extremely entertaining and fun to watch. Calling it abysmal is just straight wrong but I guess you can't just argue about taste. Some people think cucumbers tastes better than pickles. (shout out Chapelle). I'll give him a pass...if he explains himself well enough or just drops it. Lets see what Jordy choose to do.

"....frozen was pure ideology..because in most situations, Disney is pretty good at balancing out the archetypes...cause the people that created it had the idea of what it should be before they created it"

Ok cut it again,

First, how the fuck do you know the people who created Frozen had the idea of what it should be before they created it? Were you sitting there in the Magic Kingdom, between Mickey Mouse and a Caribbean Pirate when Jiminy Cricket was putting pen to paper on this masterpiece?

Second, doesn't balance archetypes? What are you talking about?
Frozen had archetypes for days. Great archetypes for that matter. Archetypes that connect with interesting truths about being humananity and that is what you want out of them, isn't it? You have Elsa. The classic hero who is gifted with a superpower that also makes her life much harder. Kinda a "With great power comes great....(I won't finish that phrase out of respect for Miles Morales) type deal. And there's more. She is so powerful, yet so dangerous that she is forced to stay away from other people. But then, when the kingdom needs her most, her power is unleashed but in a way that builds instead of destroys, a that is beneficial to society instead of just flexing her strength. That's a message about ourselves. About our individuality. The Shadow Self. The suppressed part of ourselves that need to be integrated into our lives. This is something Jordan loves mentioning. I could actually see Jordan himself talking about this, something like:

"We as individuals we are born with, well most of us who have decent iq's, are born with the capacity for great talent. But when you're a child, you need to learn to tame that. You don't want your 7 year old bursting into song in the middle of a family dinner for god sakes its embarrasing man! (pauses for awkward audience laughter) so society beats you down into suppressing that, so you're not singing in the middle of a nice christmas dinner. But later, part of becoming fulfilled is to be able to integrate that power, into something socially acceptable, and thats successful people do. And that is what Elsa did"

Up above, those words in italics, are what Jordan would say about Frozen, if he didn't for some yet-to-be-explained reason, not like the "balancing of Archetypes in this Myth.

But the real Jordan goes on to try and explain it with...

"Its propaganda. You can say exactly what Frozen is about. So its propaganda. A truly mythological based story, you could never say what its about. You could just keep talking about it forever and ever and ever."

Uhhh??? This guy just won't give a straight answer. Here's one more try.

"It's calculated marketing. It was hyper politically correct yeah yeah yeah they didn't need men and o god. give me a break."

Finally, Jordy just comes out and says it!!!
To quote Little Dickey in his underrated rap about the Lion King "you revealed your plots." I see exactly where you are coming from now, and I'm gonna tell you why you are wrong.
Musical Interlude

He thinks the writers wanted to spread the propaganda that woman don't need men and that ruins the movie for him? Soft!

FROZEN ADDRESSES IMPORTANT TRUTHS
But regardless of what Doctor Jordie Pete thinks the intention of the writers were, he never says how the story itself is flawed art. And that is because he can't because Frozen even matches his own definition of what makes good art, and more importantly, actual artist's definitions.

Later in that same video Jordan describes art as a "crystallized art of exploration." Neil Gaiman who knows way more about story telling and art than Jordan or I, says that stories "teach us how the world is put together and the rules of living in the world, and they come in an attractive enough package that we take pleasure from them and want to help them propagate... that we convey truth through stories." Since the more specific type of art we are talking about here is a story, I'm going to use this Gaiman's definition to explain exactly why Peterson is wrong -- Frozen is a great Fairy Tale, as true a mythology as any other Disney Movie.

The main thing is that Frozen explores some very important universal truths and that is what makes it a good story. I already discussed this above when I talked about how Elsa's struggle with her power mirrors two alleged truths about the world. The first, very simply is that the more power you have, the more your actions matter, examples of this in other works are Spiderman, why Plato thought the "philosopher kings" should have no wealth, and the reason why police oversight is so important. The second truth I already mentioned is the inner struggle to integrate our shadow self into our actual self. I don't necessarily believe in that second one but its something that a lot of people are saying, so who am I to argue.

But there are even more.

Probably the most basic truth I saw in Frozen is "Don't fall in love at first sight." Anna famously becomes infatuated with that sneaky Hans and the magic makers at disney are doing the most to make you think its true love. They got the songs going, they got the camera angles. But because I saw Frozen when I was 28 years old and have had my heart stomped on at least twice since the 9th grade, I knew Anna needed to be weary. Putting this in a Disney movie is a great lesson for the kids. I imagine this is something you would need to learn of experience, but just letting the kids know will help them come to grips with it easier when it happens. Try to check that the person you are infatuated with is actually a decent person and not just the first person to show interest in you. That is a great lesson for the kids.

Another pretty basic truth in Frozen which is kinda cool is that shutting something up and lying about it or pretending it isn't there is not smart. That's what Elsa and Anna's parents did with Elsa and it totally backfired. Made the sisters be separate from each other. It was really sad and it led to Anna and Elsa being so easily manipulated by Hans. This was kinda the smoking gun in the whole movie. Its kinda like the one huge mistake that a character makes in most sitcom episodes that then leads to the hi-jinx later on. You just want to scream at the tv the whole time cause its so obviously a dumb move. Then you realize, hey maybe this is something i'm doing in my own life. Maybe I should do my taxes this year instead of putting them off again because I don't want to deal with all those damn numbers (Humble brag but not really).

The thing is, it doesn't matter how many universal truths there are because Jordan is mad that
that there is no male hero in Frozen. The archetypes he was taking about earlier that are not balanced aren't any old archetypes but the masculine and the feminine archetypes. Wowww Jord. You have such a narrow view of story telling. Not every fairy tale has to have both, stop looking at the world so black and white.

FROZEN HAS CLASSIC ARCHETYPES
But hey, lets just play by his rules that every good story needs both masculine and feminine archetypes. There are plenty of masculine characters in Frozen, but I guess they just don't meet his narrow view of what a masculine archetype should be. Too bad there are already plenty of different archetypes in existing Fairy Tales.

Hans, Frozen's villainous heartthrob, fits several of these. Hans tricks Anna by seducing her and then plans to have her killed and kill her sister so he can take over the kingdom. He is someone who is desperate for power and will use deceit to get what he wants. This mirrors the cunning villain archetype in several classics like Jafar in Aladdin, Scar in Lion King and plenty more. These fit into Jordan's classical view of archetypes and there meaning for society in this way: They are all smart people who are close to power but don't actually have it. Scar, the brother of the king, Jaffar, the advisor to the Sultan, and Hans, the landless son of a king. In Jordan's classical view that supports existing hierarchies he would say that they all lack power for a good reason. Because the hierarchy is right, and they are not at the top of the hierarchy it is good that they don't have power. Therefore, when they try to get power they do it by trickery which is evil and it is a good fairy tale lesson that they fail.

Hans is a perfect archetype of someone who tries to gain power threw trickery and ends up failing. Should be textbook Peterson but he just can't bring himself to embrace it.

Another classic "masculine" archetype from fairy tales that apparently Mr. Peterson is not acquainted with is the Blue Beard/Robber Baron/Mr. Fox mythologies. These have preserved for hundreds if not thousands of years. These are tales of women who are betrothed to marry men, often powerful men but in the case of Mr. Fox, just a handsome and charming man. The woman gets curious about where this man lives, stumbles on his castle, and discovers that he is a serial killer. The woman then uses her wits to expose his lies. This is very similar to Frozen in many ways. These stories which are undisputed fairy tales and undisputed art don't need another "masculine" character. They are fine with only having the predatory man as a character. Doesn't mean all men are bad or that many men are bad. Its just that is the particular character which is needed for that particular story and you don't need anyone else.

ANTI HERO
Now, maybe Mr. Peterson can't stomach a story where the main masculine character is a bad actor. That just means he must have missed the greatest story of our generation. I'm talking Sopranos folks. -Musical interlude-

See, if Jordan really can't root for a woman hero, he could flip the whole thing on its head. He'd realize that Hans is actually a very compelling anti-hero. Now, Jordan might say "rooting for the bad guy. That isn't art." Buddy, James Gandolfini is rolling in his grave. If Jordan knew a little bit about This Thing of Ours he'd know the bad guy can be the main guy. Listen Jordan, I know you're big on your high horse about good art following a certain structure ect. ect., but I dare you to say to anyone that the Sopranos isn't art. You'd sound as dumb as Richie Aprille Jr.

In Training Day, which is a sister movie to Frozen, Denzel, the bad guy, was the man driving the action. And it can be argued the same is true here with Hanz. It is his machinations to control the kingdom, his desperation at the prospect of having nothing and becoming a royal pauper, that leads to the main events in the movie. If Jordan can't root for a woman, he should be happy enough watching Hanz try, briefly succeed, and then ultimately fail in his quest to rule the kingdom.

WORKING CLASS HERO
But say Jordan really has balls and says fuck you to the big man, Tony. Buddy, we got more male archetypes for you. There's the ice harvester, Kristoff. He's a classic good guy hero. He's on the right side of history. He does the right thing. I guess Jordan doesn't think he's enough because he's not really a leader and more of a helper and because he's not drawn like a prince but is just way more brolic. Guess what though. This Ice Harvester is a working man's hero. He'd be a main character in any number of Bruce Springsteen's Ballads. And here I am taking about another Boss from Jersey that I dare you to say was not putting out art.

GETTING REAL WITH JORDAN
Now, look. Clearly Jordan's issue with Frozen isn't that it wasn't a good story, or it didn't have any truths about our world or even that it didn't have familiar archetypes. Its not that Frozen isn't good art because it has ideology. The real problem Jordan has with it is it doesn't promote exactly the ideology that he believes is good for society. Mr. Peterson is hyper sensitive to art that doesn't reflect his "traditional" beliefs. And when it comes to gender these traditional beliefs are that women can't be heros in movies, and I guess since Jordan believes stories are so important to everyday life, that they can't be heroes in real life either.

Now, I've watched a few other videos where he discusses this topic further and I think he would say that he things women can be heroes but a different kind. He says that Beuty and The Beast is the perfect female hero story because it is about finding a beastly man, powerful and rich, and then taming him.He just doesn't think there should be stories about women themselves being the powerful beast which then becomes integrated in society I guess. Again, I predict Jordan's defense to this would be to say something like

"of course there are some women who are powerful and acheivers but when you look at the psychological studies which are extremely well researched and very reliable, you will see that the overlap shows that they are not as ambitious as men. Also, you will see that the most important eliments in romance novels bought by women show that they buy books about falling in love with powerful, dangerous men. Therefore, there is this classic story for a reason." -my imagination of what Jordan would say.

I guess my response to my fake Jordan's response to me is that first of all, just because it hasn't already been created doesn't mean it shouldn't. Just because there isn't classical art about women being powerful doesn't mean there shouldn't be and if there are, as we all acknowledge plenty of powerful women, why not have stories about them. and Second, your focus on what is classical is far too narrow. You are focusing only on stories from a very narrow swath of history that is self selected to fit into your classical stories and analyzed only under your very narrow lens which is also self selecting. If you broaden your scope, even a little bit, you will see that stories with women as the powerful main characters already exist.